Ambrose Bierce Poems

The soft asphaltum in the sun;
Betrays a tendency to run;
Whereas the dog that takes his way
Across its course concludes to stay.
...

Editor Owen, of San Jose,
Commonly known as 'our friend J.J.'
Weary of scribbling for daily bread,
Weary of writing what nobody read,
Slept one day at his desk and dreamed
That an angel before him stood and beamed
With compassionate eyes upon him there.
...

A traveler observed one day
A loaded fruit-tree by the way.
And reining in his horse exclaimed:
'The man is greatly to be blamed
Who, careless of good morals, leaves
Temptation in the way of thieves.
...

A famous journalist, who long
Had told the great unheaded throng
Whate'er they thought, by day or night.
Was true as Holy Writ, and right,
Was caught in-well, on second thought,
It is enough that he was caught,
And being thrown in jail became
The fuel of a public flame.
...

Tut-tut! give back the flags - how can you care,
You veterans and heroes?
Why should you at a kind intention swear
Like twenty Neros?
...

Twas a sick young man with a face ungay
And an eye that was all alone;
And he shook his head in a hopeless way
As he sat on a roadside stone.
...

YES, he was that, or that, as you prefer,—
Did so and so, though, faith, it was n’t all;
Lived like a fool, or a philosopher,
...

Ere Gabriel's note to silence died
All graves of men were gaping wide.

Then Charles A. Dana, of 'The Sun,'
Rose slowly from the deepest one.
...

The moon in the field of the keel-plowed main
Was watching the growing tide:
A luminous peasant was driving his wain,
And he offered my soul a ride.
...

A is defrauded of his land by B,
Who's driven from the premises by C.
D buys the place with coin of plundered E.
'That A's an Anarchist!' says F to G.
...